Over the past week, social networks have literally been overwhelmed by a wave of discussion of a number of outrageous stories from the life of Russian schools. Cases of teachers bullying students were filmed and posted on the Internet. First, a teacher from Sakhalin brought a schoolgirl to tears because of a hole in her blouse, and she did it publicly - in front of the whole class. Then footage from Komsomolsk-on-Amur appeared online, where a teacher attacked a second-grader with her fists, but he could not stand it and responded by throwing his briefcase at the teacher - a real fight ensued. In a small town near Tomsk, a primary school teacher hit a boy’s head on his desk because he constantly tossed and turned and scratched his leg. It is noteworthy that all these stories happened not with young and inexperienced teachers, but with teachers whose experience is quite long: from 20 to 40 years of work.
It is unlikely that I would be mistaken if I assume that such situations have always existed, it’s just that children have become more advanced, know about their rights and make excellent use of technology to punish teachers they hate. But I would separately note that the above are examples of direct physical violence, the incidents were filmed by child witnesses and teachers simply cannot deny their actions or justify themselves. However, more often than not, teacher-facilitated bullying occurs unnoticed, without the use of physical violence, over a period of weeks, months, or even years. The problem is that children often do not talk about such things due to fear and lack of life experience, and parents simply do not notice that their child is in danger.
The first actions of parents when a child was beaten at school
You can learn about the fact of beating from the victim himself, from a classmate, or simply notice traces of beatings on the child’s body.
It happens that children call from school and tell in tears what happened to them. In this case, mom and dad should hurry to the school. Since teachers are responsible for the health of children while they are in class. Information about what happened quickly becomes known to the director of the establishment, especially if the injuries are serious.
Arriving parents must immediately go to the manager’s office and demand that an accident report be drawn up.
Important! The director will in every possible way prevent the preparation of such documents, since public publicity of the incident may attract an inspection by employees of the Department or the Education Directorate.
However, if children have quarreled, torn clothes or caused other property (not bodily) harm, you should stop talking with parents, without advertising particularly hostile relations between teenagers. This can happen in the early grades, when children cannot yet cause serious injuries to each other if they do not use heavy objects at hand.
Systematic beatings should serve as the basis for contacting the district administration in the juvenile affairs department. In this case, the culprit will be registered and will be periodically summoned to the juvenile affairs commission.
Returning to a serious fight, it should be noted that a certificate from the school doctor should not be taken as a basis. An external examination may not always indicate the extent of the injury. Moreover, the lack of qualifications to determine harm to health will make it impossible to qualify the act in accordance with the consequences of a fight.
Of course, parents should contact the police and the emergency room. If the child cannot move independently, then it is better to call the emergency number and call a medical team to the scene. This will reduce the time it takes to register a victim at a medical facility (ambulance patients are admitted out of turn).
Passive indifference
If a teacher doesn’t hit a child’s head on a desk, doesn’t scream, doesn’t call children “idiots,” does this mean that we have an excellent teacher? No, before us is just a teacher who does not commit actions for which he could one day lose his job. The fact is that at school the teacher has power, and therefore has in his arsenal a lot of opportunities for bullying children, which at first glance are not at all obvious. How might this manifest itself?
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Most often, teachers simply do nothing. They silently watch as one of the children is consistently bullied in their class. In the 90s, there were common cases when, during a lesson, the school attendants called a student into the corridor, supposedly for some important matter, but immediately at the office they were pressed against the wall and assigned to “shoot in the yard after school.” Many have watched the series “School” by Guy Germanicus, in which all this is shown quite truthfully. Nowadays there are security guards and even cameras in schools, but children will always find ways to hide this from adults. A Barnaul resident (and journalist) told on Facebook how her son was met every day after school by his peers, beaten with pieces of ice, and not given the opportunity to go home. The story received wide publicity, and what is typical is that the school principal and teachers deny everything, despite the fact that the boy’s beatings were officially recorded. Both a post on social networks (that is, making it public) and contacting the police are just an example of what parents need to do if their child is being bullied, and teachers condone this bullying. First of all, you need to talk with the principal and class teacher, and if the teachers at school do not hear you and begin to blame you and your child for the current situation, you need to fight further: write to the local Department of Education, on social networks, contact local media. Many parents are afraid to do this, so that it doesn’t get worse, so that the child doesn’t get a bad grade because of such parental activity, so that he doesn’t look like a “black sheep.” But I suggest asking yourself the question: could things get worse?
Actually it can. The teacher has another way to use his power - agree with the parent, but behave with the child as before, demonstrating to him in every possible way that the parents will not help here. Recently, a story from one of the provincial schools was discussed on social networks, where a mother asked the Russian language teacher to let her second-graders go to recess, and not force them to complete assignments that they did not have time to complete in class. The next day, the teacher pointedly sent one child to recess, while the rest of the class continued to finish their assignments. All this was accompanied by comments: “You are tired, you need a change, go rest.” The next day this boy was bullied by the whole class. Yes, precisely because he is not like everyone else. It’s good if the child has a trusting relationship with his parents, and he talks about this. If not, then teachers can do everything to make your complaint work against you, they say, look how helpless you are, and we are the power here. What should parents do in such cases? It is very important to talk with your child, discuss every day how things are going at school, and not limit yourself to questions about grades. Children need to know that we are always on their side, no matter what happens.
Contacting medical institutions and police authorities
Parents should contact the police and ambulance if their child is hit at school.
A medical institution will be able not only to relieve pain, but also to determine the severity of the consequences in accordance with the standard classifier. A medical examination will make it possible to isolate injuries that were not received in a fight (for example, a child previously fell from a tree, resulting in a hematoma).
Upon completion of the examination, the physician will issue a report detailing the injuries and the nature of their infliction. If a child complains of any pain, and the doctor does not pay attention to it, then it is necessary to request additional research and samples (for example, a child complains of pain in the lower abdomen, the doctor included information about this in the conclusion as a lesion of soft tissues, and When collecting urine, blood is visually detected, that is, more serious consequences on the internal organs are obvious).
You should write a statement to the police. Indicate by whom and under what circumstances the victim was beaten. You can indicate who the parent suspects if the victim does not admit to what happened.
The police officer will not only interview the parents, neighbors, and friends of the offender, but will also make a request to the local police station about the characteristics of the teenager (the child may have repeatedly beaten other children in the courtyard of a residential building and the police officer was informed about this).
Based on the circumstances of the case, the policeman concludes that it is possible to initiate a criminal case or it is enough to draw up a resolution on an administrative offense and bring the fighter’s parents to justice.
Summary
What to do if a child is beaten by his classmates at school? Lawyers advise to be attentive to your children, to control their social circle, leisure time and educational process. Getting to know the teachers and having confidential conversations with the child will help prevent conflicts among peers and possible beatings.
If the situation is out of control, your son/daughter is in bad company, there is no mutual understanding with classmates and teachers, then you should protect your child in all possible legal ways. This could be a peaceful conversation with the perpetrators and their parents, an appeal to the school management, or a trial.
The main thing is not to enter into conflict with aggressors and not to break the law while trying to protect your baby. The assistance of competent lawyers will allow you to choose the right line of defense and legal support at all stages of the proceedings.
What responsibilities are provided?
Beating in an educational institution always constitutes either an administrative offense or a criminal offense.
If in the first case, penalties will follow, which should cover the costs of treatment. In the second case, real criminal liability may follow.
There are 2 influencing factors:
- reaching the age of bringing to personal responsibility;
- the severity and relationship of bodily injuries with beating.
At this stage, it is important to understand that responsibility can be imposed not only and not so much on the teenager, but on the parents.
Parents bear full responsibility for the actions of their children until they reach the age of being subject to one of the types of responsibility. And in some cases, after a certain age, when the punishment is provided in the form of a fine, and the child has no income.
An important rule about the impossibility of replacing the subject of a violation of public peace with another person does not apply when it comes to blood ties with minor offenders.
So, by what signs can you determine that a child needs your help and it’s time to intervene?
- The child often comes with bruises and scratches for which there is no reason.
- A child’s things often “break,” “spoil,” or “get lost.”
- The child is constantly looking for an excuse not to go to school - he invents illnesses, heats a thermometer on the radiator, refers to a sore stomach and head, and so on.
- The child began to eat and sleep poorly. Health problems and nightmares appeared at night.
- Academic achievement falls, as does interest in school activities in general.
- The child is constantly depressed and reluctant to make contact.
- There are cases of running away from home, attempts at self-harm, etc.
- The child’s backpack and uniform often get “torn” and “dirty.”
If at least 3-4 symptoms coincide and are repeated day after day, rest assured that your child needs your help.
In what cases can there be criminal punishment?
If it was possible to record minor, moderate or severe bodily injuries, the offender may face criminal liability. However, the law gradates the subjects of such crimes depending on age.
Minor bodily injury is punishable from the age of 14, while moderate and severe bodily injury will result in punishment for a 16-year-old offender.
In addition, if the offender commits an illegal act for the first time and the severity is determined to be mild, then punishment will not be applied. In this case, the minor may be given a warning, re-education with the participation of a psychologist, or a measure to limit leisure time will be applied.
Unlike administrative punishment, criminal punishment cannot be applied to the boy’s parents (although the father can pay a fine for his son, but the verdict will indicate that it was the teenager who beat the victim).
If the victim’s relatives filed a civil lawsuit together with a criminal one, then one punishment will be assigned unambiguously. This punishment will most likely be expressed in compensation for treatment costs and compensation for moral damages.
In fact, anyone can be at risk, and there are usually four reasons for bullying:
- The child is not like everyone else. For example, too thin or, on the contrary, overweight, wearing glasses, an excellent student or a poor student, too active or, on the contrary, too passive, a nerd or a quiet one, and so on. The reason for bullying today can be religion, physical disabilities, lack of fashionable things and the profession of parents, the shape of the eyes and the inability to stand up for oneself, and so on.
- I fell under the hot hand - I found myself in the wrong place and, as they say, at the wrong time.
- The child is new in the class. Sometimes that's enough.
- The child himself behaves defiantly and provokes everyone to retaliate by boycotting or bullying.
Involving school administration
It is possible and necessary to complain about the school in such a situation, because the school assumes obligations in accordance with the Law “On Education”. In addition to writing a complaint to regulatory authorities to find those responsible for what happened, you can demand compensation from the school for damages. A child could only be beaten if the children were not under the supervision of teachers. That is, we can talk about the negligent attitude of employees (head teacher, director, class teacher) whose work is related to preventing such situations.
Moreover, the student will most likely have to transfer to another school, where he will not be bullied by his peers, knowing that the child was hit by other children in the previous educational institution.
Each country has its own nuances of prosecuting minors for aggression at school. The situation in Ukraine is similar to the Russian one.
Letter of the law
The most important thing that parents need to do in such a situation is to open a set of laws that regulate the rights of children. You can start with the simplest thing: any school has a charter, which probably states that children have the right to respect for human dignity and protection from psychological and physical violence. If children are not allowed to go to recess, this is also a violation of their rights. You can read about how their life at school should be organized in the sanitary and epidemiological requirements (SanPin). As a rule, there are enough links to such documents, but you can always refer to the Federal Law “On Education”, which clearly states the responsibilities of teachers. After all, according to Article 21 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, no one should be subjected to torture, violence, or other cruel or degrading treatment or punishment. These laws need to be printed and used as arguments in school conflicts.
Separately, I would like to say that such articles and posts are usually accompanied by comments in defense of teachers. Like, it’s also hard for teachers, the children “bring them to grief.” This, for example, was emphasized by the teacher’s defenders in Komsomolsk-on-Amur: the second-grader, according to them, was “insane,” insulted the teacher, disrupted lessons, so the teacher could not stand it. We forget that an eight-year-old child and a teacher with almost half a century of experience are not equal forces. If a child violates the rules of behavior, then it is teachers, psychologists, speech therapists, and neurologists who must help him overcome them. Adults cannot respond to violence with violence precisely because they are adults and must set an example for children. By supporting bullying, we, as adults, subscribe to the fact that we can live according to the laws of the wolf pack, that the one who is stronger wins.
The other side of this conflict is that the teacher, like the entire school, has ceased to be an authority for the children. Old school teachers, in turn, want children to listen to them with open mouths and obey in everything. But as before, it will no longer be the case - the teacher today is not a unique bearer of knowledge, because we can acquire a lot of knowledge without his help. Therefore, now the teacher must offer something in return, something that the children especially need. First of all, these are respectful and trusting relationships, the transfer of life experience, and the ability to overcome conflict situations with dignity.
- The price of security. What does “knife fighting” teach in a Perm school?
- In first grade: why children don’t want to go to school
Or maybe it’s not necessary after all?
There are times when a parent wonders: “Will it get worse for the child if I interfere?”
Yes, there are situations in which it is better not to get involved. But if it really comes down to bullying, which the child is not able to cope with alone (and not a one-time insult or quarrel between classmates), then how can you make it worse by stopping this bullying?
Imagine for a second what could happen to your child if he cannot cope with this burden of problems? It’s better to get involved where you weren’t invited, than to greatly regret later that you didn’t intervene.
Why do some children tease others?
Sometimes children joke and make fun of each other because they are simply bored.
Do nothing. And they can’t come up with anything else interesting and smart except to cackle. “Oh, your pants are inside out, ha ha ha!” But some children laugh at those who are different from themselves in some way - those who have big ears, or who are always tripping and hitting corners, who have a funny last name, or who stutter slightly. And here it would be even more correct to say: they do not laugh, but ridicule. Because they do it on purpose, deliberately and many times.
Let's think: why do they do this? Because they themselves are strong, brave and self-confident? Do you think so? Not at all!
A truly satisfied and confident person will never make fun of others. He just doesn't need the people around him to feel awkward and confused.
But an insecure person sees himself as a small and unsightly tree. But he really wants to be big and strong. And to feel like this, what does he do? He begins to put others down in order to build himself up.
When one person makes fun of another, he is trying to make him lower and himself higher. By this he seems to be saying: “That’s how important and significant I am, I don’t have the shortcomings that you have. I am better, and you are worse."
Or maybe he is afraid that people around him will see his own shortcomings and laugh at him. And to prevent this, he himself begins to tease first.
Do you think this is right? Is this how you should behave - ridicule others in order to give yourself importance or to escape from your own fears?
I'm sure your answer is no. This is wrong, dishonest and very stupid. You can't behave like that! No person has the right to make fun of another just because he is different from others in some way - wears glasses, speaks slowly or does not know how to ride a bicycle.
However, unfortunately, there are children who want to be cooler than others. Or maybe someone is offending them themselves? Therefore, they try to win back and shift their insecurities onto someone who seems weaker to them. And they start making fun of him.
What to do in such cases? How to react?
How should a teacher behave?
What should he do? Someone will say that a teacher must be a competent psychologist, must delve into the problems of children, find an individual approach to each child and there will be happiness! Yes, I agree, this method works.
But a teacher is not required to be a psychologist, and the entire range of services listed should not be the teacher’s responsibilities. The teacher must give knowledge! And the behavior of students should be controlled by the parents of the children, this is their responsibility.
But nothing, under the current legislation, nothing can be done with children.
You can completely devote yourself to work, give all of yourself for 20 000
rubles per month. But if you give all of yourself to other people's children at school, what will remain yours? An emotionally exhausted mother coming home after work is not a good thing, especially when it happens every day.
You can ignore all problems and endure, and this is a more correct approach. Until we introduce punishments for this behavior of children, nothing will change. And it doesn’t matter what the punishment will be:
- severe penalties for children's misbehavior;
- give the teacher the right to kick children out of class without consequences for the teacher;
- expulsion from school for bad behavior;
- or something else.
Previously there were TsOM
s
youth education centers
. The most problematic children were sent there and specialists in such children worked with them. In the schools themselves there were correction classes, where the most inveterate students were also sent. Now this allegedly insults children and such measures are a thing of the past.
How to protect a child from unlawful actions on the part of a teacher
For a child, physical violence from a teacher is a serious psychological trauma. Therefore, parents are obliged to do everything right and not aggravate this conflict. On the other hand, not taking any measures is also wrong. If the school administration has ignored the parents’ appeal, and the police are in no hurry to take the case to court, it makes sense to transfer the child to another educational institution.
Parents of students who become victims of nervous teachers should not only be indignant and demand punishment for the teacher. It is important to understand that not a single teacher, if everything is in order with his psyche, will beat a student. But if you provoke it, which modern children are quite capable of, then something similar can happen. This problem is not only to blame for the teacher, but also for the parents, the lack of disciplinary measures to control the behavior of children, and much more.
Teachers who beat children need to be punished in different ways. If it is just a nervous breakdown, then it is quite enough to fire the person. But if there are such aggravating factors as hatred (racial or national) and the systematic nature of the beating, then you definitely need to go to the police. The severity of the beatings inflicted on the student also influences the punishment.
